The Bad Guys
by Light My Crazy Diamond
Summary: Super Ness Galaxy #002: The Bad Guys. Lord Bowser and his indomitable army of doom attempt to conquer a planet Ness and Cordelia are visiting.
1. The Bad Guys 1

Our story begins with an army of a million Goombas and Koopas, forming a mobile rectangle that stormed through the hills and plains of Generic Animal Crossing Village #72. They sang as they marched, they marched as they sang: "Bow to the Bowser! Bow to the Bowser!" Houses burned to smoke, bridges crumbled into dust, the town's signature wind turbine creaked and shuddered before completely breaking into parts. As anthropomorphic animal villagers of all shapes and sizes screamed their lungs out and ran for their lives, two silhouettes, one large and the other small, ascended the highest hill of this once-peaceful village.

"BWAAA HA HA HA HA HA HAAAAAA!" guffawed Lord Bowser as he thrust his head to the red, searing heavens above. In the clenches of his right fist was the long pole of a flag, the end of which he used to brutally stab the earth. The flag itself, deathly black with the white imprint of Bowser's pernicious smile, billowed madly in the howling winds.

"Yes, run, you lowly creatures, run!" Bowser roared over the shrill screams and pathetic pleas. "Run, but know you can't hide from the unstoppable, all-powerful forces of Lord Bowser – the king of all conquerors, the vanquisher of the virtuous, the dominator of doom and destruction!"

"Well done sir!" Kamek, his loyal right-hand commander, cried as together they surveyed the scene of mass domination before them. "With Generic Animal Crossing Village #72 in our clutches, you now rule the entire Village Green Preservation Galaxy with an iron fist! Not one evil ruler has as many planets as you do now!"

" _Yes_ ," Bowser growled with a maniac grin on his face that spoke of all kinds of power-hungry perversities prevailing his thoughts. "And after this galaxy –" (the camera pans away to reveal a galaxy of colorful planets) "– I'm going to take over the entire cluster." (the camera pans away to reveal a cluster of multicolored galaxies) "And after that, I'm going to take over this entire supercluster." (the camera pans away to reveal a cluster of multi-multicolored clusters) "And after that, I'm going to take over the ENTIRE UNIVERSE!" (the camera pans away to reveal the ENTIRE UNIVERSE) "BWA HA HA HA HA! BWA HA HA HA HA HA HAAAAAAR!"

As he broke out into his evil laugh for the umpteenth time, so too did Kamek join in, so that there was a gaggle of evil laughter trailing from the peak where

 **THE BAD GUYS**

currently stood.

Now, the camera of your imagination drops several miles below to the foot of the hill, where Ness and Cordelia looked up to the display of pure tyranny.

"Oh my fuzzing Goonie! It's Lord Bowser!" Cordelia gasped.

"Lord what now?" Ness asked, clearly confused at his friend's reaction.

"Bowser!" Cordelia repeated, and despite her fear she could not keep the hint of incredulity out of her voice. "Don't tell me you've never heard of this guy before! He's practically the most evil villain in this entire universe!"

When Ness shook his head, Cordelia grabbed Ness by the shoulders. "Well, now is not the time for an education. We leave this planet, _now_!" Then, turning immediately to the zebra lady transfixed in horror at the new kings of her home world, Cordelia quickly said, "Well – Savannah, was it? – thanks for giving us this – nice – uh, minimalist table –" Cordelia held up a green leaf that in no shape or form resembled any table whatsoever "– that we're probably never going to use in our lives. And do forgive us for failing to uphold our end of the bargain, buuuuuut I think it's high time we skedaddle! Wouldn't you agree?"

Evidently she did, because Savannah quickly turned tail, began screaming at the top of her lungs, and ran away with her arms high above her head.

"Think Luma's got enough charge to launch us out of this fiery mess!" Cordelia grinned as she unzipped the white Luma from the smaller compartments of Ness's bag. "You ready to bust outta here, buddy?" Then, upon hearing no answer from him: "Buddy?"

Cordelia looked up from the Luma whom she was gently waking up with slight taps of her finger, and gasped.

"Ness! What do you think you're doing? Get back here!"

And with a quick _zip!_ she looped her tongue around Ness's waist and whisked him right back by her side.

"We can't just _leave_ , Cords!" Ness shouted, grabbing Cordelia's tongue and unwrapping it from his body. "These people need our help, and it's our duty to stop this Lord Bowwow from taking over this planet!"

"Since when was it _our_ duty? We're not intergalactic superheroes like Super Mario or the Star Fox team! We're just two nomadic travelers trying to look for your – _hey_!"

For Ness had slipped out of the grasps of her tongue and was again making his run up the hill. Immediately Cordelia ran after him, weaving and twirling her way through the massive throng of fleeing villagers. What they were running away from became immediately clear as the herd of bodies thinned: An avalanche of massive fireballs rumbling and tumbling down the hill, roasting the skin of their backs and leaving trails of blazing destruction in their wake.

And one particularly huge ball was plummeting straight towards Ness –

Immediately Cordelia flutter jumped up, threw the table-leaf in her left hand, and tackled Ness down. The leaf, upon hitting the ground, exploded into a table, pure white and minimalistic in design. Turned on the length of its side, it offered ample cover for Ness and Cordelia to duck behind and avoid the worst of the fire.

"Okay, fine, so we used it _once_ in our lives," Cordelia admitted with grudging reluctance, keeping herself well behind the table as the fireball scraped the tops of their heads. Then she turned to Ness and snarled, "Are you fuzzing nuts? You realize who we're going up against, right?"

"Lord Bowwow?"

"Bow _zer_ ," Cordelia corrected as she planted a firm hand down Ness's back. "And this guy's got more planets under his rule than any other villain in the universe! You really think we can go up against him and his massive army by ourselves? I always knew you were crazy, but I never thought you were this _stupid_!"

"But Cords," Ness whined, struggling to pull himself up as the screams and explosions of the battlefield roared around them, "we can't just run away and leave these people under the tyrannical rule of a crazed dictator after all these valuable gifts they've graciously given us!"

"We just traded five day's worth of fruits for three useless tables and a lamp shaped like a mushroom," Cordelia glowered under her breath.

"And besides, if they're the bad guys, then shouldn't we, as the good guys, be the ones to stop them?"

"No, _that_ is something heroes do. _We_ are not heroes. We're just two travelers who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. Don't you ever get the two mixed up again!" Cordelia jabbed a finger up Ness's chin so that he was better looking into her stern, glaring eyes, and continued, "Now. I am going to have Luma turn into a Launch Star and blast us out of this planet, and you are going to stay perfectly still and not attract any unnecessary attention so we can get out of here in one piece. You got that?"

Ness did not respond, but rather rolled his pupils around, breaking his gaze from Cordelia's to look around him.

"What?" Cordelia cried, frustrated in the lack of response as she swiveled her head around – only to gasp in horror as she saw what she had been ignoring in the heat of her lecture.

A thousand Koopas and Goombas, each with a hardened expression on his face as they surrounded the two stragglers who had foolishly chosen to seek refuge behind a table with a giant charred hole in its center. It was through this hole that Bowser pointed his meaty clawed finger, shouting, "Who dares stand in the way of the Great Koopa Army? Bring them to me at once!"

"Perfect," Cordelia muttered bitterly as she sagged her eyelids and shoulders in defeat – before perking them back up again in panic. "Ness! What are you doing?! Stay down! We need to –"

"I'm sorry, Cords, but I'm not about to be humiliated by an oversized tortoise and his army of dumpy mushrooms!" Ness yelled in glee as he launched himself off the table. "No!" Cordelia shrieked. She pounced forward and tried to grab Ness by his ankles – but it was too late: Ness was already sailing through the air, and Cordelia could only watch, hopeless and helpless, as her best friend in the entire universe was pulled down to earth by the vicious violence of the vile villains, his soft flesh pounded and punctured by fists, kicks, teeth, his body brutally mauled and torn apart by an evil that knew no limits…

…Or at least, that's what she expected to see. What she really saw was the back of his boyish figure bounce with youthful grace off of body to body, squishing shrooms and smashing shells as the Koopas and Goombas tried desperately to catch the runaway youngster currently giving the top of their skulls a real bad time.

"…Huh," Cordelia could only say, as confused as she was impressed. She watched her friend catapult off the hapless craniums of what initially seemed like an indomitable army, before directing her gaze down by her feet, where a Goomba tried desperately to get her moving by throwing his body against her calves.

"Move it, dinosaur breath!" the Goomba shouted as he continued to bump his rounded cap against her shoes. "Wait till Lord Bowser sees that we captured an actual Yoshi! He always wanted one for himself before that massive purge wiped out most of your species –"

 _SPLAT!_ With a swift stomp of her boot the Goomba became flatter than flattened pancakes underneath her sole. The immediate chorus of gasps was followed by a series of angry grunts as Cordelia twisted her foot left, right, left, right. When at last she was done venting most of her anger, she lifted up her foot, crossed her arms over her chest, and blew some steam out of her nostrils.

There was a long bout of silence as the paper-thin Goomba stayed completely still.

Finally, a red Koopa tentatively called out, "G-Gary? You okay?"

Upon hearing the call of his name, Gary the Goomba's eyes and mouth flung open, the latter of which screamed, "Gaaaaah! My brains! It's being digested by my stomach! Aaaagggghhhhhh!"

And the crushed mushroom monster scuttled about in panic, rendered blind by the pain and the fact that his eyes were now only about half an inch wide.

"You guys are just a bunch of pushovers!" Cordelia grinned as the realization lit up her eyes and sent her tail into a frantic wag. "It doesn't matter if there's a million of you – a million times zero is still zero!"

"Watch your mouth, Yoshi!" the red Koopa roared, and with his battlecry the rest of the battalion quickly closed the circle around her. The surge in confidence, however, was irreversible, and Cordelia flutter-jumped high into the air, brought her legs up above her waist, and absolutely pulverized the unsuspecting goons underneath her butt.

"Woo hoo hoo hoo!" Cordelia screamed with primal mirth, while those lucky enough to avoid the brunt of the blast hesitated take a single step forward. Just before she was about to launch herself up again for a second coming, Cordelia turned, cupped her hands around her mouth, and yelled, "Ness! You were right! We can totally beat these guys! Show them what you got!"

"Oh I will, Cordelia old girl," Ness smiled to himself, his expression of gleeful freedom a huge contrast to the furious rage crumbling the better of Bowser's features. "Yes, I will."


	2. The Bad Guys 2

The drastic shift in Bowser's expression had been a phenomenon in of itself. His maw, once sneering in the brazen confidence incited by the sight of an entire planet succumbing to his forces before him, faltered more and more with each successful jump the little boy landed off his subordinates' heads. His eyebrows, once set in firm place over his eyes in composed glee, climbed higher and higher over his head to expose eyes completely round in disbelief. The laughs that once boomed from his throat slowly muffled themselves into inaudible spurts of grunts and growls, until finally he turned to Kamek and found a roar loud enough to express his displeasure.

"KAMEK! Why is my army of supposedly well-trained soldiers failing to stop a single tiny little boy?! _And why are you just standing there and doing nothing about it_?!"

"Don't worry, sir!" Kamek hastily cried as he quickly straightened his back and pushed up his glasses. "The little brat may have the mobility to outjump our soldiers' ill-protected heads, but he certainly won't be outjumping _this_!"

Kamek pointed his scepter at Ness and tracked his movements with precise dexterity. His mind ticked furiously with calculations that involved extensive trigonometry and projectile kinematics, all the while channeling forth an ancient reserve of magic and directing it into his wand arm. When at last the ruby brooch glowed with hot, intense power, Kamek pointed his scepter at the spot he calculated where Ness would be a split second later, and shouted, " _Crystallius Magopius_!"

A stream of triangles, circles, and parallelograms, each flashing a unique color, blasted from his wand and hurtled straight towards Ness. It was a spell that, upon contact, would instantly trap the better part of his body in a rigid crystal and immobilize him – but the youngster remained unfazed. "Oh, so firing magic spells is your special power, huh?" Ness said as he trampolined for the twenty-fourth time off of another unfortunate Goomba's head. "Well, I have the perfect counter to that!"

And, thrusting his arms in front of his chest with palms open wide, Ness declared, "PSI Magnet!"

A psychic field of blue energy materialized suddenly from his hands, spherical in form and covering a wide area directly in front of him. It coursed and crackled with psionic bursts of electricity, displacing all photons and molecules within its vicinity to create a blurred, shimmery boundary of ethereal blue. It was, in other words, a zone of complete protection for Ness, and the burst of magic that was supposed to hit him squarely in the chest instead collided with the mystical field of magical magnetism and disappeared unceremoniously within the vortex of its center.

"Thanks for the power up!" Ness shouted with glee as he resumed his bounces, jumping faster, harder, and higher than ever before, while Kamek's lower jaw dropped all the way to the ground.

"Gwwaarrgghh! Why is everyone so useless at their jobs? Must I do everything around here?" Bowser screamed in utter frustration, curling his claws into fists and stomping his foot. Then he ambled forward, pushed Kamek away with a brutal thrust of his claw against his chest, and stretched his jaws wide.

"Eat this!" Bowser shouted, before launching yet another meteor of magma, this time more supermassive, more superheated than all the prior fireballs that had spewed from the pit of his lava-producing stomach.

"Hmm," Ness murmured as he sailed high into the air. He rubbed his chin nonchalantly while the deathly ball of blazing destruction hurtled down the hill, consuming the unfortunate members of the Koopa army who happened to be in the wake of its trajectory. "Well, I _could_ have absorbed this with my PSI Magnet. But seeing as how it's on cooldown…"

He folded his arms to his chest, brought his hands close together as though about to clap, and shouted, "PK Shield!"

From the center of the space between his hands appeared yet another sphere of psionic energy, this time a hot bubblegum pink in color. Within seconds the bubble of impenetrable protection encompassed his entire body. The fireball cascaded all over the bubble, engulfing the spherical barrier with its raging flames, licking the outer coating in a desperate attempt to consume the organic flesh sealed inside. But it did as its name implied, and when the fire passed and the bubble receded back into inexistence, it was to reveal an unscathed Ness joyfully continuing his ascent up the hill, finally allowed to run thanks to the large amount of space cleared.

It was Bowser's turn to drop his lower jaw all the way down to the ground.

"What – but – how –" he sputtered.

"Oh, impressed?" Ness called out, the closing distance allowing him to more clearly see the expressions of distraught on the enemies' faces. "Well, guess what? I can make it around my allies, too! Watch and learn –"

Ness turned around, aimed the index and middle fingers of his right hand at Cordelia, and again shouted, "PK Shield!"

And just in time too, because the humongous fireball was about to sear through the distracted Yoshi. There was a brief moment in which Cordelia stood still, visibly confused by the torrent of hot flames washing over her and wondering just why exactly she wasn't already burning to death, before noticing the trademark pink shade of the capsule her friend so often generated.

"Thanks, Ness. I always know I can count on you," Cordelia muttered gratefully, before proceeding to punch in the face of the Koopa she had in a chokehold.

"But that's no fair!" Bowser whined, pounding the ground repeatedly with pouty stomps. "I stuffed myself with Kirby's Superspicy Curry last night to make some of the hottest fireballs ever! It was so bad it gave me diarrhea for three hours! How can he just blow through my attacks like they're nothing?!"

Kamek frantically flipped through the pages of his personal spell book, before finally landing on a page that depicted an illustration of a magical forcefield being shredded apart. "According to my extensive knowledge of character archetypes and the general kinds of power each possesses, what we have here is a flanking tanker who uses his defensive properties of shields to negate incoming attacks and harass the backline attackers! Luckily, I happen to have just the spell to –"

SMMAAASSSHHH! Kamek was flying through the air before the words were fully out of his mouth, his contorted face the recipient of a baseball bat swing.

"Ah, you talk too much," Ness grinned as he shouldered the bat and gazed into the distance that his homerun was fast dwindling into.

"You!" Bowser snarled, quickly recovering from the brief shock of seeing the little boy so suddenly appear before him. "You snot-nosed little brat! If it weren't for you I would have this entire galaxy under my rule by now! You – you ruined _every_ thing! I'll ruin you!"

"Woah, woah, calm down there, Bowwow! I don't want to hurt you if I don't have to, so what say we just sit down and have a nice little –"

" _My name's not Bowwow!_ " Bowser yelled, further interrupting Ness's attempt to make peace with a slash of his claws. Ness ducked quickly to avoid having nails as sharp as… Well, nails claw into the flesh of his face. His cap floated briefly in midair, before he snapped back up and nestled the headwear comfortably atop his messy black hair.

"I was hoping you'd do that," Ness smirked, quickly stepping away before Bowser could follow through with any further swipes. "Luckily I saved the best for last."

"Don't tell me you have even more powers!" Bowser screamed in aghast disbelief as he bumbled forward in a desperate attempt to seize Ness before he could employ any more of his psychic abilities – but it was already too late. With a quick conjuring of his shield to guarantee his safety, Ness adopted his most lively stance yet: The trademark pose of a rebellious teenager playing the air guitar, complete with fingers squeezing down on an imaginary G chord and arms bent at appropriate angles to shred some serious riffs, and yelled, at the top of his lungs, " ** _PK ROCKIN!_** "

A neon explosion of red, blue, and yellow lights exploded from Ness's hands, of an incandescence so brilliant that it forced Bowser to squint his eyes and throw his arms in front of his face. From in between his fingers Bowser witnessed the radiant formation of a pure-white electric guitar, resting comfortably in Ness's hands despite appearing as though it could sizzle the flesh of anyone who dared hold it. Ness, now sporting sharp triangular shades of red and blue, gave the guitar a few cursory plucks, before playing the opening note to a catchy 60's pop rock-style song with a swift strike of his pick down:

 _Bowwow, you think you're wow-wow  
_ _But let me just tell you right now-now  
_ _You're stupid, and you smell bad  
_ _You're a manchild, and that to me's just sa~ad_

Bowser didn't even have time to be offended by the explicit lyrics of this parental advisory-rated song, because from the superstrings of Ness's transcendental guitar spewed a psychedelic jetstream of the three aforementioned colors. It swooped and it looped, it twirled and it swirled; it was a raging river of red, blue, and yellow, flowing and growing according to the whims of his tune. It was only until the song drew to its conclusion and Ness struck the finishing chord that the torrent of sonic energy finally reared its multicolored head and struck Bowser directly in his stomach.

The effect was immediate. Bowser joined Kamek in becoming but a small twinkle in the red clouds wrought by his own fiery breath, so quickly gone that the only trace of his existence was his fading cries of "Gwwaarrgghhh…"

The shades and the guitar slowly dissolved from his face, and Ness, now resembling more boy than rockstar, wiped the sweat off his brow, and whispered, more to himself than anyone else, "See you soon …"

" _No! You'll see me right now!_ "

"You're kidding me, right?" Ness gasped, a rare expression of disbelief etched upon his face as he looked up to the object casting a huge ominous shadow over him.

It was an airship, and a colossal one at that. A giant stone effigy of Bowser's head protruded from the very front of the ship, making the identity of its captain unmistakable. Three massive propellers spun about the towering masts to keep the ship flying high in the air. From the starboard hung a long rope ladder that members of the Koopa army were desperately climbing so as not to be marooned. On the bow of the ship were none other than Bowser and Kamek themselves, though now looking much for wear than when they had previously stood tall and mighty on the peak of the hill.

"If I can't have this planet," Bowser continued to roar, pumping his fist and glaring daggers into Ness, "then _no one_ can! I'm going to blow this planet into tiny chunks of rock with your stupid face on it!"

"Sir, please reconsider!" Kamek cried as he attempted to pull Bowser's arm away from the remote control in Bowser's other hand. "Generic Animal Crossing Village #72 is all we need to exert total dominance over the entire Village Green Preservation Galaxy! Please sir, let's just take a bit of a break before we –"

" _I don't care_!" Bowser screamed, flinging Kamek off his arm with a single violent shake. "If I blow this planet up into itty bitty pieces so that it doesn't exist, then I'll own this entire stinking galaxy anyway! I'm going to use the destruction of this pathetic little world to set an example of what happens when anyone dares cross Lord Bowser – _the king of all conquerors, the vanquisher of the virtuous, the dominator of doom and destruction_!"

And his resolve made clear, Bowser squished the big red button on the remote. Somewhere deep within the recesses of the ship, the low grumbling of a ticking, churning mechanism rumbled to life. From the wide mouth of the figurehead popped out a huge cannon blaster, menacing in both its size and deathly black color. An equally black, sadistic-looking Banzai Bill poked its head from the mouth of the barrel, and Bowser, after further confirming the trajectory the missile of doom should take on his remote, sneered, "Goodbye, you flea-bitten beasty beasts! Didn't want to rule a zoo for a planet anyway!"

Such were the words of a sore loser as the Banzai Bill launched from the figurehead, its bloodthirsty eyes growing ever wider in anticipation of the complete carnage its collision would wrought. The villagers' happiness at the Koopa army's retreat proved shortlived as they again screamed in panic and pointed their fingers at the apocalyptic harbinger of doom descending from the hell-twisted heavens. Cordelia herself, upon seeing that the Banzai Bill was about to blow itself up on the peak of the hill where Ness still stood, finally lost her composure and ran frantically up the slope, screaming, " _Ness!_ Come on buddy, let's _go_! We can't save this planet from a Banzai Bill! Trust me, I know! Hurry up and get down from there –"

Ness, either because he was frozen in shock or simply out of earshot, did not budge.

" _Ness!_ " Cordelia screamed in pure desperation again, tears beginning to flow from her eyes as the sadistic smile of the Banzai Bill eclipsed any hopes of escape.

Ness remained standing, his own eyes boring fearlessly into the glare of the animate missile. Not an ounce of fear contorted the muscles of his face, not a bit of dread diluted the stoic calm of his eyes. In the fateful moment before he, his best friend in the entire universe, and an entire planet of innocent animal-people would be blown to organic smithereens, Ness was oddly at ease with himself, and the circumstances of the cosmos that had anchored him to this very spot.

Then he whipped out his baseball bat, drew it over his left shoulder, and gave his widest grin yet.

"Did I mention my bat has reflective properties?" he said simply.

 _Every_ one's lower jaw dropped all the way down to whichever surface his or her feet happened to be resting on. Bowser's, Kamek's, the Koopas' and the Goombas', Cordelia's, the villagers', even the Banzai Bill's as a clean _thwock!_ to its face turned it an instant hundred-and-eighty degrees around and sent it flying right back at Bowser at twice the speed it was initially fired.

"No no no no no no no no!" Bowser screamed in pure horror, recovering first and grabbing the wheel to give it a wild spin. The back thrusters of the ship throbbed and spat, the propellers on the masts spun harder than ever, Kamek and the rest of the Koopa army ran about screaming their heads off in mad, mad panic – but nothing they did could stop the utter annihilation of their ship. The Banzai Bill found its delayed mark a little ways beyond Generic Animal Crossing Village #72's atmosphere, and the denizens of the planet witnessed a truly spectacular firework that officially marked the eradication of Lord Bowser's rule… By blasting him halfway across the other end of the galaxy.

"See you soon, Bowwow," Ness smiled to himself, for total realsies this time, as several planks of wood and shards of ruby-tinted crystals rained down from the red-turning-blue skies.

"Ness! You did it!" Cordelia cried as she quickly closed the remaining distance to wrap her friend into a tight, full-body hug. Ness returned the loving gesture by looping his own arms around her waist, and for one sweet moment boy and dinosaur did nothing but embrace each other – that is, until Cordelia suddenly unwrapped herself and punched Ness straight on his head.

"Ow!"

"You had me worried sick, you know that?" Cordelia yelled right into Ness's face. "Couldn't you have just taken out your bat and reflect that thing sooner? Why'd you wait so long to hit the fuzzing thing?"

"Dramatic effect," Ness replied, rather cheekily.

"Oh, I hate you so much," Cordelia grumbled, snorting angrily and crossing her arms over her chest.

"Aw, loosen up, Cordelia old girl! We just stopped the most evil villain in the entire universe from taking over a planet all by ourselves! We really are heroes after all!"

"Oh, no no no no no," Cordelia snapped back as she wagged a strict finger in front of Ness's grinning face. "We are _not_ heroes. This was strictly a one-time, stop-the-bad-guys-because-we-had-to kind of thing. Under no circumstances is this going to become out usual shtick. Our first and foremost priority is always going to be to find your –!"

"Too late!" Ness interrupted as a massive crowd of villagers swarmed in from all sides to lift their bodies up and throw them repeatedly into the air. "He-roes! He-roes!" they chanted, and though Ness basked in the glory of his newfound popularity, Cordelia looked quite unsure of all the attention they were receiving… That is, until inspiration struck and a greedy little smile twisted the curls of her mouth.

"Hey, as heroes of your village, we'd be honored to accept any… _Gifts_ you might want to give us!" Cordelia announced, barely keeping the excitement out of her voice as she envisioned piles upon piles of roast meat, fruit pies, turnip salads… "I mean, you know, we did just totally save your planet from being destroyed by the tyrannical rule of a crazed dictator and all…"

She did not need to say anymore. The hands that were not already supporting them were now producing boxes and boxes of neatly-wrapped gifts and throwing them her way. Cordelia licked her chops wet, a stream of saliva drenching the heads and arms of the villagers lifting her back, as she imagined stuffing her face with a delicious, scrumptious feast…

"Here, take my daffodil table!"

"And this is my prized princess table! Please, you deserve it!"

"Please accept this humble Gracie low-table as a sign of my gratitude!"

"Are tables the only thing you guys have around here?" Cordelia cried in exasperation, the image of the feast already shattering into million bits and pieces.

A lamp shaped like an egg sailed through the air and bounced off her nose. "Bingo," Cordelia murmured murderously as she rubbed the sore spot of her snout, while Ness, as playful as ever, laughed in good-natured fun at Cordelia's mildly inconvenient predicament.

They did not know it then, but if they did, it would be much to Ness's delight and Cordelia's horror that this was only the first of many instances in which they would become heroes that stood up in the pernicious face of evil and administer their justice upon the plague of baddies that roamed the universe.


End file.
